Two snaps, no carries for a first-round pick? What’s the deal with Rashaad Penny?
Rashaad Penny led the Seahawks in rushing yards during a game this season.
Yes, that really happened. This season. Just last month, in fact.
It only seems like years ago.
Seattle’s first-round draft choice way back in 2018 had 62 yards on 10 carries with a deft, one-cut touchdown dash of 37 yards to help the Seahawks win at Pittsburgh in week two. He got that after an adjustment at halftime with offensive coordinator Brian Schottenheimer. They exploited the Steelers aggressively blitzing Seattle’s favorite run gaps on read-option plays.
It looked on that warm, winning day in Pittsburgh, Sept. 15, as if Penny was paying off. It appeared the number-two running back behind Chris Carson was meshing with Schottenheimer’s plans and play calls, that he was finally becoming a valuable component to the offense.
“We went back and watched film,” Penny told me that day, as he walked from the locker room to the Seahawks’ team bus taking them to the airport. “If I would have cut it back (then), it probably would have been the same result, or a good gain.”
But thanks to the halftime study of Steelers defensive looks on the team’s tablet device, what was a small gain in the first half became the touchdown on the same play that broke open a 14-13 game in the second half.
“Same exact thing. Same exact run,” Penny said. “So I said, ‘Forget. Let’s go for all the marbles here. Just make one guy miss.’”
He did. Penny cut sharply to the right, showing the balance, agility and speed that made coach Pete Carroll and general manager John Schneider trade then select major-college football’s rushing leader out of San Diego State in round one last year.
“We pay attention to all the little things,” Penny said. “We look back and say, ‘OK, what can we do different?’
“I saw that. And it’s just making plays from there.”
And that’s pretty much the last we’ve heard from Penny.
Since then, he’s devalued. Again.
He was inactive for three of the next four games after Pittsburgh because of a hamstring injury he got during a light, Friday walk-through practice two days before the following game, the home loss to New Orleans last month. He returned from that injury last weekend to play Baltimore.
Well, not really play Baltimore.
The Seahawks ran 71 offensive plays against the Ravens. Penny got in for just two of them. That was the fewest of any offensive player. He got as many carries as you did in Seattle’s 30-16 home loss.
“That wasn’t part of the plan,” coach Pete Carroll said. “It just didn’t work out. I wish he would’ve played more. It just didn’t happen.”
It just didn’t happen for Penny again.
Last weekend was the eighth time in his 1 1/2-season career he’s either been active for a game yet got zero carries or been inactive. Penny has gotten four or fewer carries in five other games. His career high for rushes in a game is 12. That was last Nov. 11, when he romped for 108 yards on just 27 snaps and looked very much like a first-round pick in a narrow loss at the Los Angeles Rams.
That and Pittsburgh last month have been the exceptions. Idling or mostly watching has been his Seahawks norm.
In his 24-game career (23 in the regular season and January’s playoff loss at Dallas), Penny has had four or fewer carries or not even touched the ball 13 times.
More than half his time in the league so far, the first-round pick has had next to no impact.
Meanwhile, Carson has been an 1,110-yard back for the top rushing offense in the NFL last season. He is on pace for a 1,200-yard season this year.
Play caller Brian Schottenheimer was asked Thursday about the Penny not touching the ball and watching from the sideline as even third-down back C.J. Prosise got a carry, one, for 17 yards against the Ravens.
“It was one of those deals where Chris was kind of going. He was feeling good. He’s been playing so well lately,” Schottenheimer said “C.J. (six snaps) didn’t play much, either.
“I don’t put much on it. We know we need Rashaad. We’re excited about Rashaad. So I don’t put too much into it, other than the fact that we only got 26 or something rushing attempts. He played a few plays.”
Schottenheimer added of Penny: “He’s a big part of our plans.”
That perhaps a hint to Penny getting a lot of work in Sunday’s game at Atlanta.
Or perhaps not.
If Penny indeed is a big part of the Seahawks’ plans, they have odd ways of showing it.
This story was originally published October 25, 2019 at 7:21 AM.
